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With subdued styling, excellent driving dynamics, and weak yen helping keep the R&D costs down, it’s no surprise that Honda’s latest Accords are hot-sellers. What may be surprising is that this year’s Green Car of the Year awards panelists couldn’t agree on what car to give the award to. What they did, insteand, was give it to three: the 2014 Honda Accord, Accord Hybrid, and Accord PHEV! You can check out the full story, below, in an article that originally appeared on the Environment News Service. Enjoy!

LOS ANGELES, California, November 22, 2013 (ENS) – The 2014 Honda Accord has been chosen as the Green Car of the Year®, but this year the award goes not to just one model but three: the Accord, Accord Hybrid, and Accord Plug-In Hybrid. “Green Car…

A few weeks ago, Ford announced that its new 2014 Ford Fiesta with a 1.0 liter Ecoboost 3 cylinder engine was the highest MPG car you could buy that wasn’t a hybrid with its 32/45 (37 combined) mpg rating. Almost immediately, the Mitsubishi fan base started grumbling. “Not so fast, Ford!” they said. “Mitsubishi has the highest MPG car you can buy that’s not a hybrid, the Mirage CVT that gets 37/44 (40 combined) mpg.” For the most part, though, a lot of the media guys that I know dismissed the Mitsubishi, with one even saying “Mitsubishi’s not a thing anymore.”

Could that be true? Could it be that the driving force behind the DiamondStar turbos and the 2.2L Dodge Shelbys of the 80s were simply “not a thing anymore”? I didn’t buy it, so I reached out to Mitsubishi and asked to drive one of the new Mirage CVTs- a few days later, a 2014 Mitsubishi Mirage CVT ES in “Infrared” showed up at my door in Oak Park.

My first impressions of the Mirage were largely positive. It’s a cute little car, with much better proportions than the neighbor’s Smart despite the tiny wheels. The Infrared paint, too, was deep and reflective. So far so good, I thought as I looked through the Mitsubishi paperwork- the $15,990 ES PKG included all the usual power this and cruise that, along with ABS, traction control, a CD player, and a few other safety gizmos. It even had a few options (which ticked the price up a bit, of course) like fog lights and a Bluetooth system.

Getting into the highest MPG car in America was easy enough, and I was met with my first happy surprise …

… a starter button.

I know, I know- in 2014 a starter button is nothing to get excited about, but my last exposure to a Mitsubishi was a 2011 Galant. That experience was not positive, so to find a little bit of sporty playfulness in the Mirage gave me some hope. Glancing over at the 140 MPH speedo (see, above) also made me chuckle, since the Mirage, in stock trim, makes just 74 hp from its 1.2 liter non-turbocharged engine.

I was already smiling before I started the car. The little engine buzzed to life and settled into its idle as I adjusted the seats. Nothing special there, but they were significantly more comfortable than, say, the seats in the Sonata Hybrid I drove in Texas. I put the little Mirage in “D”, and puttered off with the wife in the passenger seat.

“What do you think?” I asked.

“Why doesn’t it have a mirror up here?” she asked.

It was a question answered with a question, so I knew the little car was in trouble. Sure enough, there was no mirror in the passenger-side sunshade. “That’s pretty janky,” she said, flipping the sunshade up, dismissively. “You know what happened,” she began. “They had a group of people in a focus group somewhere, and they thought ‘Yeah, I usually drive alone, so I don’t care if there’s a mirror over there’, but that’s the kind of thing that would make me, as a passenger, think it was a cheap car.”

I had to agree with her, and not just because I’m a little afraid of her. I looked at the steering wheel of the Mirage, and I felt like I didn’t need the audio controls. I would have traded those for a mirror on the passenger side. I had a tachometer, too, in a car with a CVT. I’d have traded that for a mirror, too- which reminds me: in D mode, the Mirage is absolutely misrable in-town.

Yeah, no “car guy diplomacy” here. In D, the Mirage CVT “upshifts” too early, is never on boil, and is genuinely bad. There’s a fix, however, and it looks like this:

B mode. In “B” mode, the Mitsubishi keeps its engine right around its 4000 rpm torque peak, and throttle response becomes instantaneous. The effect, on a car this small, light, and otherwise low on power is utterly transformative.

Instead of behaving like a miserable little “econobox”, the Mitsubishi Mirage CVT in B mode behaves like a cartoon turtle with a nest of angry honeybees crammed under its shell. It scoots, too! Driving around town in B mode, I never felt like the Mirage was underpowered- and during Monday evening’s snow dump on Chicago, I got to test the Mirage in snow, on the interstate, in heavy rush hour traffic. I never felt like I was in a cheap car (helped, I’m sure, by the comfortable seat and leather steering wheel/shifter, which were all I touched, for the most part).

After a week of fun, inner-city running about with the little Mirage, I was more than a little sad to see the car go.

“Maybe,” I said. “It kind of depends what we can get out of that engine block.”

“What did you get out of the race car?” she asked, referring to the white DSM drag car me n’ the boys are planning to run next year.

“That’s making about 800 wheel,” I said.

“At least you’ll be able to get it to 140, then,” she said.

That’s true- but will I actually buy one? If I did, I’d go for the lower-end DE version and skip the cruise control and steering-wheel audio buttons, but I’d fight the dealer pretty hard to get the leather wheel and shift knob. I’d get mine in “Kiwi Green”, too, since I decided the Infrared looks like it’s trying way too hard to be an “upscale” color and it plays better with the “bee-ridden turtle” analogy that I came up with earlier … and the fact that I’m even that far along in the process should tell you how much I dug driving the highest MPG car that’s not a hybrid.

What did you think of the Mirage? Have you driven one? Did you like it? Let us- and Mitsubishi!- know, in the comments.

I can’t write enough about the incredible Lord Drayson and his cutting-edge electric race car, the B12/69 EV, which is helping pushing zero-emissions racing into the future at a very rapid speed. Chris Harris, host of the YouTube show DRIVE, had a chance to get behind the wheel is this incredible electric race car, and even this seasoned pro was left speechless.

Harris is no stranger to fast cars, and he has even been banned from Ferrari’s press fleet for badmouthing the Italian automaker’s carefully-controlled/manipulated ties with the automotive press. He even has time behind the wheel of powerful electric vehicles, like the Mercedes SLS AMG Electric drive, so instant and tremendous torque isn’t something new for the tire-shredding auto journalist.

But with 850 horsepower and a body made from lightweight racing components, Lord Drayson’s B12/69 EV electric race car is a whole different kind of fast. Packing batteries built into body panels and a wireless charging system, this is the cutting edge of electric racing. Though the battery pack is currently only strong enough for 10 to 15 minutes of full-throttle racing, well, let’s just say that Harris’s commentary should be proof enough that this quiet race car means serious business.

The new for 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid goes on sale today, with a reasonable pricetag, a 50 MPG EPA rating, an almost impossibly low-emissions 4 cylinder engine, a torquey electric motor, and withOUT a conventional transmission.

As I mentioned in my initial review of Honda’s 50 MPG Accord Hybrid earlier this month, this new Honda is different from other hybrids. Instead of an engine connecting to a conventional gearbox or CVT, the new Honda’s engine is directly connected to the drive wheels. The torque multiplication of lower gears is simulated with variable input from the electric motors at low speeds. As before, the best way to sum it up is like this: the 50 MPG Accord Hybrid drives exactly, precisely, and inimitably like a slot-car.

The batteries, electric motors, and Earth Dreams engine inside Honda’s new hybrid are definitely awesome, but the real magic to the car is in its ECU …

… which is massive.

The 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid’s driving dynamics and fuel efficiency all come down to that box up there. Much more than a conventional ECU, the Honda unit acts as a voltage converter and capacitor, handling how much juice goes from the battery to the motor and back into the battery during regenerative braking and engine braking. It’s a marvel, and it’s complicated enough that the three Honda reps I was listening to describe all did so using slightly different, equally simple, deceptively confusing analogies. Still, the system works- the implication there being that Honda’s engineers are smarter than me … and I can live with that.

You can buy the 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid today for as little as $29,155, which climbs to $34,905 with all the digital, leather, and sliding see-through roof goodies tacked on. So, that’s it. Go out and get you one.

Here it is, the revolutionary new for 2014, 50 MPG Accord Hybrid. Before we get too far into my driving impressions of the car, though, I want to make a few things clear. First, the new Accord hybrid is a revelation. Second, In-n-Out Burger is seriously overrated. It’s all about the vastly superior Whataburger, and that was the first stop I (and the similarly burger-wise Jeff Palmer, from Temple of VTEC) made in Honda’s newest toy.

At that point in the drive, the Whataburger manager rushing into the parking lot to ask us why we were taking pictures of the Whataburger was the most exciting thing about the drive. I was riding along in the passenger seat. The roads weren’t particularly twisty or elevation-change-y. The Accord was, from the front passenger seat, an Accord. It was excellent, in typical Honda, but it didn’t seem like the kind of thing you’d fly a dozen journalists out to a swanky hotel to ooh and aah over, you know?

I was about to express something along those lines to my eager pilot, in fact, when the roads started to get twisty, and some kind of sick change came over him. Out of nowhere, he decides he’s some long-lost AndrettiEarnhardt Senna heir, and we are screaming into corners – which are clearly marked “35” – at almost 70 mph. I know how fast we were going, because I was afraid, the tires were howling, and I pulled the bitch move of looking at the speedometer.

“Sure it is,” I thought. Still, I stayed mostly quiet about the speed we were carrying into corners, thinking about how I’d been on racetracks with guys named Andretti, Kendall, and Frentzen (among others) at seriously Serious speeds, and how I was going to die in the middle of Texas because some frustrated race-car-driver-turned-blogger wanted to see how the new Accord Hybrid compared to the S2000.

We drove until we saw the giant armadillo …

… then switched seats.

I spent some time adjusting the Honda Accord’s driver’s seat. Height, seat angle, steering wheel – they’re all adjustable. I made sure I could see out the mirrors, and I took a quick inventory of the dash. Big speedo. No tach. Looking down, I saw “P R N D B” in the console. I drove around a bit in “D”, like a good little auto-journo, until we pulled into a Honda-designated checkpoint at a golf course, where Jeff got out to snap some pics of the car.

“What’s ‘B mode’?” I asked Jeff, now happily buckled into the passenger seat.

“Braking,” he explained. “It uses the engine and electric motors to slow the car down and charge the batteries. Put it in ‘B’, that’s what I was using.”

Fair enough. We pulled out onto the twisty, hilly roads outside of San Antonio in a 50 MPG Honda Accord Hybrid, and I immediately started speeding.

I couldn’t help it.

It was the car.

“Damn!” I said, whooshing through another corner way too easily.

Jeff just nodded.

In “D”, the car feels limp and stupid. Avoid D.

In “B” mode, with an almost 1:1 connection between your foot and the Accord’s speed, it’s perfect. Understand, too, as you read all this, that I am supremely jaded when it comes to “sporty” cars. I ride motorcycles. In addition, over the last 15-16 years I’ve been driving Moslers, Ferraris, AMG Mercedes, Corvettes, Lamborghinis, Porsches, and (of course) 1000+ HP Nissan GTRs fairly regularly. None of them were as bonehead simple to make go fast in real-world conditions as the Honda. None of them were as smooth, and – with the exception of a particularly eager blue Mosler Raptor maybe a dozen years ago – none of those cars actually made me smile.

This new Honda is different. Its engine is directly connected to the drive wheels with clutches that use variable input from the electric motors to make up for the lack of torque multiplication at low revs. I’ll cover that in my next Honda Accord Hybrid article, though – all you need to know is this: the 50 MPG Accord Hybrid drives exactly, precisely, and inimitably like a slot-car.

Want to slow down? Back off the gas pedal. In my tester, backing off hauled the car down from 50-ish mph to 20-ish quickly enough to make braking through the twisty roads optional. Even in stop-and-go, there was almost no coasting. Give it a bit of gas, it rolled forward slowly. Take your foot off, and the car stopped. Go into a corner too hot? Back off the gas. Tires still quiet mid-corner? Give it a bit more … now, maybe a bit more. I SAID GIVE IT MORE, DAMMIT!! All of that, and we never – no matter how we pushed the car in B mode – saw MPG drop below 46.

Most of the time, we saw more than 60 mpg.

All that said, the only thing this new Accord Hybrid needs to be the perfect everyday car is a set of tasteful-looking performance wheels to replace the factory hubcap simulators and a set of grippy tires to replace the low-rolling resistance nonsense the cars were saddled with during our test drive. Make that swap, paint the thing mouse gray, and you’d have a perfect high-speed Q-ship to blast down the highway with.

“That’s what we wanted,” said Art St. Cyr, head of Honda’s motorsports program and one of the company execs on-hand at the event. “We wanted it to be a hybrid and we wanted to hit a number (presumably, he meant that 50 MPG mark), but we wanted it to be fun.”

Based on my experience driving Honda’s gas-powered V6 coupe version of the Accord (with the 6-speed manual), as well as the 4 and 6-cylinder gas versions (also on hand) I think Art’s nailed it. The 50 mpg Accord Hybrid is the best Honda Accord. It’s the most fun Accord you can buy – and also the most expensive. But, hey- you get what you pay for, right?

In a world of rising gas prices, strict emissions standards, and a demand for better and better performance, automakers face often conflicting goals. Jaguar, which has built massive V12 engines in the past to power their coupes and luxury cars, is the first niche automaker to admit that it may one day ditch V8 (or larger) engines entirely

Jaguar’s marketing and product director Steven de Ploey told Australia’s Drive magazine that Jaguar “…is not wedded to V8s. CanJaguar exist without V8s? “The answer is yes, but is it our intention at this stage to eliminate the V8 from our engine pallete? Clearly not because we need it for our performance.”

For now, V8 engines still deliver a power-to-cost ratio that is too good to ignore, but hybrids are fast becoming a premium performance option among luxury car buyers. And if there is anything luxury car buyers love, it’s “premium” anything.

If you’re looking for an ultra-lightweight, low-emissions car that looks like a million bucks, goes like stink, and is made almost entirely of renewable and recycled materials in a low-energy, low-emissions factory then you, dear friend, are shopping for a Morgan. A few weeks ago, I made a comment that boiled down to “if you have the means, buy a Morgan“, and the video, below, spends about 20 minutes backing me up.

What’s in the video? I’m glad you asked!

Keep your eyes and ears peeled and watch out for references to Morgan’s fuel-cell concept car, being developed in conjunction with BMW. Pay attention when they mention that, because of the low load that Morgan’s lightweight wood and aluminum chassis place on the engines, they can run older V8s and still meet the most stringent fuel-efficiency standards. Make a note of Morgan’s leadership in aerospace materials and alternative fuel technologies, and definitely pay attention to the way Charles Morgan talks about wanting to build a wooden car that can be “kept going”, and be passed on from generation to generation. And don’t forget Morgan’s use of ash wood in his cars’ frames! Morgan says wood gives his cars unique strength, flexibility and (according to research) makes the cars safer in crash tests!

Neat stuff.

So, here is a fantastic, 20-ish minute production from Drive’s Matt Farah that gives viewers a remarkably in-depth look at how Morgan’s wooden cars are built, and what makes the cars – and the company! – truly special. The wood part starts at about 5:40 in. Enjoy!

What has 887 horsepower, 940 ft-lbs of torque, and is a hybrid? The Porsche 918 Spyder, that’s what, possibly the most anticipated supercar of 2013. Journalists and reporters are lining up for a chance to drive this million-dollar Porsche, and Chris Harris is one of the first to get some seat time. Color me jealous.

Powered by two electric motors making a combined 240 horsepower and a gas-powered V8 engine offering another 647 ponies, the Porsche 918 Spyder is quite possibly the most powerful hybrid car on the planet. TO get from 0 to 62 mph takes just 2.8 seconds, and in a mere 23 seconds this supercar will take you to 188 mph. Madness, absolutely madness.

With just 918 examples planned for production, Harris is in elite company, and he knows it. While he tries to offer a level-handed review of the car…how could he? This is easily one of the most fun vehicles ever developed. If you’re a hybrid supercar fan, this video is a must-watch.

There’s one reason, and one reason only that I got into automotive writing; my overwhelming desire to drive the cars that most people go their whole lives without driving. I’m still working my way up that ladder, but one day I hope to be in the position that Chris Harris, host of the YouTube series Drive, finds himself in; driving the Mercedes electric supercar, the SLS AMG Electric Drive.

With 740 horsepower and 737 ft-lbs of torque, the Mercedes SLS AMG Electric drive takes the typical gullwing Merc and replaces the whole drivetrain with an electric setup that delivers serious performance. Harris goes on to detail how many aspects of the SLS AMG are familiar, and yet how unfamiliar this car really is.

There aren’t many YouTube videos worth watching for nearly 20 minutes, but if you’re into electric supercars, this video is a must-watch. Definitely check it out.

It wasn’t all that long ago that I was a poor college student hard hit for cash. The thought never occurred to me that maybe I could save a few buck by walking or biking to class instead of storming around campus in my 1995 Pontiac Trans Am. Man, I miss that car. Today, college students are more keen on their transportation options, and this handy-dandy infographic breaks down the most popular options.

Obviously, riding a bike or taking a bus isn’t an option for every college student. But for those students who live near campus or public transit lines, they could save big money by opting out of driving (unless of course the Bank of Mom or Dad is funding said vehicle). That said, while biking or taking the bus can save money, driving can be a big time saver, provided you avoid traffic. It’s hard to put a price on time…though many colleges do offer free public transit options for students, and free anything is (almost) always awesome.

Anyway, I found this infographic pretty interesting, and thought I’d share it with all you college students accumulating mountains of debt in an effort to better yourselves. At least now you know the options, and while you might not save enough to pay off all that debt, you might scrounge together a few extra bucks for pizza and beer this week. Stay classy friends.

As the world’s automakers slowly move to embrace electric vehicles, each brand or group is taking a decidedly different approach to EV’s and hybrids. Just look at the vastly different approaches of Toyota and Nissan. While Toyota is working to develop a battery with 600+ miles of range, Nissan says that 95% of Americans only need 100 miles of range a day.

Driver’s Don’t Need Long Range EV’s…

Batteries are by far the biggest expense factor when it comes to electric cars, and contribute to the bloated MSRP’s of cars like the Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt. Another supposed shortcoming of electric vehicles are their limited range, with the Leaf officially rated at just 73 miles in average driving. And while many consumers claim they want more range, according to Nissan, they don’t actually need it.

Nissan cites data it collected from Leaf drivers that shows the average Leaf driver only travels about 37 miles per day, and the average trip was only seven or so miles. Nationwide, 72% of drivers travel less than 40 miles a day, and 95% of Americans travel less than 100 miles a day. The problem is that if you do want to travel a significant distance, you are limited by an EV’s range. American consumers may not need that extra range…but they want it available should they need it, some day.

…But Consumers Want Long Range EV’s

Toyota meanwhile is taking the opposite approach. Japan’s largest automaker is close to finishing a solid-state battery with 600 miles or more of range on a single charge in a compact electric vehicle. In “existing” vehicles the battery would only provide 124 miles or so of range…but that’s still a major improvement over just 73 miles provided by the current Nissan Leaf. T

he battery could be ready for production between 2015 and 2020, though there is no mention of costs or charging time, two huge factors in EV acceptance. And while 600 miles of range on a single charge sounds nice, the huge difference in range between “compact” and “existing” cars raised my eyebrows. When they say compact, do they mean a car…or a golf cart?

I like Tesla’s scheme best; base pricing on range. The Model S sedan will be available in 160 mile, 230 mile, and 300+ mile flavors, with a $10,000 price bump between models. I think the major OEM’s need to take a look at this pricing strategy, as some people may only need that 60 or 70 miles a day. Other people will surely pay a premium for extra mileage if it is priced right.

So which strategy do you think will win out? Is Nissan right that people don’t need a lot of range, or will Toyota become an EV leader with its 600+ mile battery? Or is Tesla doing it right with their priced-by-range method? Let me know down in the comments!

Lexus’ performance-oriented GS450h hybrid promises supercar acceleration and Lexus’ usual levels of “vault silent” luxury, with just enough green-washing to keep the GS’ usually performance-focused buyers from feeling too guilty about their non-Prius purchase. Given a chance to put one through its paces, my good friend Ari Cox over at Sub5Zero discovered this hybrid’s secret: that electric motor? It makes the car faster.

Gunning the engine from a start causes it to pause for a millisecond and ask you a simple question “Are we doin this?.” And when you drop the hammer and say “Hell yeah!” the GS450h says “Word!” and gets you on your way with an urgency you’ll not soon forget. 0-60 mph comes quickly at just 5.2 seconds. But where the GS450h really shines is at higher speeds, especially on the highway where passing and carving through traffic with an effortless agility is truly awe-inspiring.

Looks like the guys had some fun! Many more pictures and a fully detailed review/road test can be found at the original article.

To drum up some attention to the forthcoming 2011 Sonata Hybrid, Hyundai took its new hybrid on a cross-country trip, from San Diego to Georgia. They made the 2,269 mile trip on less than two full tanks of gas.

In 1984, General Motors and Toyota joined forces to produce cars together at a single plant in Fremont, California. Called the New United Motor Manufacturing Inc., the joint venture gave Toyota its first manufacturing base in the U.S., and GM a chance to learn from its rival Toyota on quality and lean manufacturing techniques. Over the years the plant gave us the Geo Prizm, the Toyota Hilux, and Pontiac Vibe/Toyota Matrix, among many other items.

One could argue that one company benefited more than the other from the partnership. But when GM announced it was shuttering the Pontiac brand, it also pulled out of the NUMMI plant, leaving Toyota holding the reigns. Toyota announced it too would pull out of the plant, and it looked like another manufacturing center and hundreds of jobs would be lost. Enter Aurica Motors, maker of electric cars. They have a plan to save the plant, and many of the jobs, by retooling the plant to build electric cars.

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The content produced by this site is for entertainment purposes only. Opinions and comments published on this site may not be sanctioned by, and do not necessarily represent the views of Sustainable Enterprises Media, Inc., its owners, sponsors, affiliates, or subsidiaries.